Microfluidic devices and methods are of significant and increasing importance in biomedical and pharmaceutical research. Microfluidic technology is applied to sequentially synthesize or batch synthesize fine chemicals and pharmaceuticals. Continuous flow micro-reactors have been used but not limited to manipulate individual chemical processes on nanoliter to microliter scales with advantages of enhanced heat transfer performance, faster diffusion times and reaction kinetics, and improved reaction product selectivity.
Large-scale synthesis modules have been developed and used for the preparation of a number of radiopharmaceutical compounds. However, such modules or reactors occupy a large amount of space, often consume larger than desired amounts of reagents, and the chemical process requires longer reaction time cycles than desired for the preparation of the labeled compounds.